Many providers of television programming collect information about what shows or television channels are being watched by viewers. Such information is used, for example, to determine the popularity of particular television shows or channels, to analyze trends in entertainment or news, and to aid in determining pricing for television advertisements. Furthermore, in some cases, media providers benefit from having access to channel information of a channel being viewed by a particular user in order to customize a user experience based at least in part on that information. While media devices inside a user's home are typically able to identify the channel that is being displayed to a user at any given time, such information is rarely available to outside entities.
Accordingly, it is highly desirable to provide systems and methods for collecting television viewership information from individual televisions.